tiffanybangle4

A little to the west is Bagru, a town noted for its vegetable dye-based textile printing industry. Raje planned a golf course and international convention centre there and the Gehlot government axed that as well. To the south, farmers wonder about the fate of the Ring Road for which the previous government had started land acquisition but not a km of road has been laid.

Gehlot's reflexes are emblematic of his record in office ever since he took over as Chief Minister. It's almost as if he thinks he has to distance himself from anything he thinks is even remotely connected with Raje and her work. This has adversely affected the working of the wholesale silver pendants bureaucracy. He set up the N.N. Mathur Commission-later wound up on the Rajasthan High Court's orders-which most bureaucrats believed was a witch-hunt to identify pro-Raje babus who he presumed were anti-Gehlot.From the narrow pool of advisers and officers left, he mostly picked up typical work-to-rule babus who were content just taking orders. "He distrusts officers who did well for her," says an officer who was close to Raje but was sidelined and is now seeking a deputation to Delhi. "A chief minister is like a jockey. He must know how to get the best out of the horse," says M.L. Mehta, former chief secretary of Rajasthan.

Gehlot's faith in tokenism is enough to make many of the bleeding hearts in Congress turn green with envy. He would not spend money on an urban area unless he gets the Centre's grant, but would think nothing about spending Rs 170 crore to provide wheat at Rs 2 a kg to those living below the poverty line in the state to please his Congress bosses in Delhi."He is pro-rural and fears that excessive urban spending would invite a backlash," says a bureaucrat close to him. Mehta differs. He cites example of the Bhamashah scheme where Raje had marked Rs 750 crore to be distributed as Rs 1,500 to each rural poor woman by wholesale silver earrings her bank account. "Gehlot stopped this empowerment scheme even when Raje had deposited Rs 150 crore with a bank," he says wondering why Gehlot never let the women have the money, which is still with the bank.

Such confusion or unplanned action can be seen in a lot of other schemes across the state, including those in Jodhpur, Gehlot's home town. For instance, last year much before the monsoons arrived, he launched the "Green Rajasthan" scheme without even earmarking space for saplings to be grown in a state that's essentially a vast desert. When the saplings dried up and crores of rupees went down the drain, C.P. Joshi, Union Minister of Rural wholesale silver necklaces and an emerging local rival embarrassed him before aicc general secretary Rahul Gandhi, calling the greening campaign a failure.

"We aren't against reforms. We are levying taxes to complete the first phase of the metro by 2013. But the code of conduct for the first few elections has slowed us."Ashok Gehlot, Chief Minister of RajasthanSimilarily, the Government loudly announced the building of a new Jaipur, an idea which didn't take long to die as land could not be identified. But sloppiness was at its best when Gehlot and Urban Development Minister Shanti Dhariwal spread the red carpet for a Malaysian firm which promised to manufacture, install and run monorail systems in five cities at their expense in January. They sold it as a success story and even had plans to make a presentation before Rahul. The company never returned.Another dream project-the metro-is another example of Gehlot's lack of a long-term perspective. The model for the proposed metro was changed a number of times from government to public-private to wholly private to loaned from a foreign bank to first phase public-second phase private if an investor could be found. But Gehlot carries on nevertheless. He, recently, brought up the other proposal once again and called his cabinet to raise taxes worth Rs 600 crore to fund it. "We will wholesale silver rings the Ring Road and bring the metro to Rajasthan," he says. How and when is still unclear.If Gehlot's first tenure was marked largely by a weak administration, in his second tenure he appears vindictive and seems to be losing the goodwill that brought him to power. He has made too many compromises, giving in to the demands of defectors and the independent MLAs whose support is crucial for his minority government to stay in power."Gehlot's proposals keep coming and vanishing. He has stopped everything I began and pushed the state behind by a decade."Vasundhara Raje Scindia, former chief minister of RajasthanDuring his last tenure, whenever things went wrong he was quick to blame an unfriendly and far-from-helpful NDA government at the Centre. But with the Congress at the Centre, Gehlot no more has that option. Facing criticism that Raje managed funds from Congress-ruled Centre, Gehlot recently went to Delhi to meet Sonia Gandhi over a political crisis arising out of cross-voting by three of his ministers in Rajya Sabha polls and then, extended his unscheduled visit to four days to meet with Union Minister for Urban Affairs, Jaipal Reddy, Union Minister for Information Technology (IT), Sachin Pilot, and Union Minister for Petroleum, Murli Deora.